heykidscomicsfandomcom-20200214-history
Smash Comics Vol 1 18
Supporting Characters: * Adversaries: * Miss White and her seven dwarfs Other Characters: * Locations: * Items: * Vehicles: * | Appearing5 = Featured Characters: * Supporting Characters: * Adversaries: * Von Thorp Other Characters: * Locations: * Items: * Vehicles: * | Appearing7 = Featured Characters: * Supporting Characters: * Adversaries: * Dr. Moku Other Characters: * Professor Chase * Mr. Lane Locations: * Items: * Moku's device for making the invisible visible Vehicles: * | Appearing10 = Featured Characters: * Supporting Characters: * Adversaries: * Morris Carleton Other Characters: * Locations: * Items: * Vehicles: * | Appearing11 = Featured Characters: * Supporting Characters: * Adversaries: * unnamed mad scientist * several fanged monsters Other Characters: * unnamed girl Locations: * an elaborate mad-science citadel hidden under a swamp Items: * Ray Gun Vehicles: * | Writer6_1 = Will Eisner | Penciler6_1 = Dan Zolnerowich | Inker6_1 = Dan Zolnerowich | StoryTitle6 = Espionage Starring Black X: "The Battle of Bermuda" | Synopsis6 = Axis warships, plus a minefield, are blockading Bermuda. Aboard the unnamed U.S. flagship, on a moonless night, Black X briefs Admiral Jepson, then he and Batu sneak past the Axis ships in a small sailboat, and reach Bermuda. After a huddle with the unnamed Governor, Black X is authorized to assemble and command a long line of tied-together torpedo boats, small boats, and rafts, which he then uses to mine-sweep a clear path thru the Axis minefield. (Nobody local has thought of this; no Brit nor U.S. Navy man has thought of this; a secret agent has to come to Bermuda from Washington to make this happen?) Several heavy U.S. warships sail thru the gap to Bermuda and they engage the enemy fleet in an old-school naval gunfight, augmented by Black X & Batu in their torpedo boat. Black X suddenly realizes, based on no new info seen by us, that enemy paratroops will soon be landing on the opposite side of Bermuda, so they scoot around the island and set up a machinegun nest next to a wharf where these paratroopers are assembled. The paratroops, inexplicably wearing paradeground dress uniforms, with jodphurs, plan to move in boats to their attack on the island's fortifications, but now here's Black X shooting up the boats, so they mass-attack the m.g.nest, at an absurd cost in mowed-down casualties, then they suddenly swarm the position but inexplicably none of these paratroops are still carrying the bayonetted rifles we saw on the previous page, so there's a fistfight, which goes on until Batu (sent inland earlier, to fetch grenades) shows up with a force of U.S.Marines. Soon the bad guys are routed and Bermuda is again secure. In the last panel, Black X seems to have uncharacteristically not yet returned to WDC, but is still in Bermuda basking in the accolades of the admiral and governor. | Appearing6 = Featured Characters: * Supporting Characters: * Batu Adversaries: * Axis military forces Other Characters: * Admiral Jepson * Governor of Bermuda * President Franklin Delano Roosevelt Locations: * Items: * Vehicles: * | Notes = * The Ray: ** Though Miss White is shot by one of her seven dwarfs, we don't see which one, and all seven are present with none objecting; in any case the Ray blasts them all into nothingness. ** The Ray can switch back to Happy Terrill's clothing and appearance just by thinking about it. ** The Ray can eavesdrop or visually observe events at great distances. ** The Ray can stop a passenger train by diving into its headlight. It may be a factor that the brakes were already applied. * Espionage: ** Based on internal and previous timeline evidence, this Black X story is thought to have taken place circa 1940-Nov. In the Quality Universe, the USA has been at war, officially declared or not, against the European Axis, since probably about July 1939, when the first Axis task force bumped up against the Pan-American Caldwell Line blockade, back in Smash Comics #7. The blockade has later been replaced with an Atlantic-spanning suspension bridge in Hit Comics #4, and the war has been interrupted with several bipartite and international peace treaties. In any case, this story opens with Axis warships, plus a minefield, blockading Bermuda, facing down a US task force commanded by Admiral Jepson. * Magno: ** At the end of this story, the pretty girl is not visible nor accounted for, the mad scientist is unconscious but probably alive, and Magno has definitely confiscated that death-ray pistol for his own use. ** The unnamed mad villain's secret lair is a large subterranean masonry structure, accessible via a swamp, near Tom Dalton's home town. In Smash Comic #21, three issues later, Magno either finds a second large subterranean masonry structure, accessible via the swamp, or a second unnamed mad villain has adopted the abandoned base of this issue's monster-maker. * Also featured in this issue of Smash Comics were: ** Purple Trio: (Seal of Justice), art by Alex Blum ** Chic Carter: (Crashing the Concentration Camp), by Vernon Henkel ** Abdul the Arab: (The Story of Sunyan Tse), by Bob Powell ** Scarlet Seal: (Tong War), by Duane Byrd Monroe ** Wings Wendall: (The Madness Serum), by Vernon Henkel | Trivia = | Recommended = | Links = * Read the complete issue at the Digital Comic Museum * Smash Comics #18 entire issue }}